2010-11 Season Review
Signature Wins: It is hard to argue that the biggest win of the 2010-11 season was not the Fords’ 62-61 win at McDaniel College in the opening round of the Centennial Conference tournament. The victory pushed Haverford into the tournament semifinals for the first time since February 2007. Falling just shy of the McDaniel win is most likely the 84-72 win at Muhlenberg College in the regular season’s penultimate game. The Fords were on the brink of falling out of one of the five playoff spots and a loss to the Mules would have pushed them off the edge. Two other nail-biters likely tie, pun intended, for third on the list: back-to-back overtime victories, the first an 85-81 win at home over Moravian College followed by an electric 108-105 win at Ursinus College.
Season Notes: The team’s 14 wins ties for the most wins in a season since the 18-win campaign of 1976-77. This winter was also the fifth time in the past eight seasons that the Fords qualified for the Centennial tournament … In addition to the road-winning accomplishment at McDaniel, the win over the Mules was the first in Allentown since a 71-62 win in February of 2005 … The season sweep of Swarthmore College stretched the unbeaten streak over the Garnet to nine in-a-row … Graduating senior Sam Permutt registered 10 double-doubles during the season including a 19 point, 11 rebound game in the conference semifinal at Franklin & Marshall College in what turned out to be his final collegiate game. Freshman Brett Cohen notched the only other double-double by a Ford over the course of the schedule … Permutt closes his career ranked third on Haverford’s all-time list in offensive rebounds (179) and blocks (82). He also set single-season marks for the program in offensive (71) and defensive rebounds (143).
Postseason Awards:
- All-Centennial Conference: Ian Goldberg (second-team), Permutt (honorable mention), Cam Baker (honorable mention)
- Centennial Academic Honor Roll: Bo Friddell, Goldberg, Permutt, Eli Schwarz
Looking Ahead: The Fords bring back their first, third and fourth-leading scorers next season in Baker, Goldberg and Friddell. Baker worked both ends of the floor registering the second-most steals within the conference. Taking on the yoke of rebounding that fit so nicely on Permutt’s shoulders will be rising sophomore (freshman????) Brett Cohen who played much of the season in a rotation down low with Permutt. Another newcomer from 2010-11, Louis Cipriano, made his presence felt from beyond the arc. Sometimes way beyond the line. Cipriano finished third in the league in three-point field goal percentage giving the Fords a dynamic long-range duo as Goldberg led the league. Court-time experience will also come from Joel Michael who hit the floor in 25 of the team’s 26 games.
2010-11 Season Outlook
Head coach Michael Mucci’s 2010-11 Haverford College men’s basketball team certainly falls into the ‘cupboard isn’t bare’ category. It didn’t look like that would be the outlook for this season two-thirds of the way through the schedule last year, though.
A road loss to Muhlenberg in late January of the 2009-10 campaign left the Fords 3-8 within the Centennial Conference standings and 5-12 overall, but a closing run of six wins in the final seven games not only brought the Fords to the brink of the league tournament but also showed what the coach would bring to the new season.
Four starters from that squad — senior Sam Permutt, juniors Bo Friddell and Ian Goldberg, and sophomore Cam Baker — bring an elevated level of confidence into the beginning of this season lifted by the late-season surge and a solid summer of work from league play in Philadelphia or workouts at home.
The quartet, the top four scorers for Haverford in 2009-10, combined to produce 71 percent of the offense, pulled down 403 rebounds and was credited with 130 steals; definitely something to build on heading into a new season.
With four starting spots seemingly set, it leaves one up for grabs and the competition is hot between a mix of other returning players and six newcomers to the roster.
Seniors Lekan O-Nicholson and Adrian Sills-Takyi, junior Joel Michel and sophomore Eli Schwarz saw varying degrees of minutes throughout the 24-game schedule last time around and bring that experience to the hunt for playing time this season.
Many of the freshmen bring a different element to the battle, one that gives Mucci multiple choices on how to deploy a five-man team on the floor this year: height. Five of the six are at least 6-footers with four cracking the 6 feet 4 inch mark. The combinations available to Mucci will increase as the freshmen gain on the experience the returning starters and upperclass men own heading into the schedule.
There will be a shorter, quicker line-up that should be able to ratchet up the defensive pressure, or a big-guy group that will try to pound the ball inside, and obviously several different combinations in between depending on opponent’s weaknesses and who’s hot and who’s not at the time. Other aspects that such an experienced squad brings into the new season are increased optimism and expectations.
“The guys coming back, especially the captains [Permutt and Goldberg], will be the leaders of this team,” said Mucci. “They’ve already been seasoned by Centennial battles over the years, and this group is so positive about where we want to go and how to get there that the new guys will catch up quickly which will help us out greatly.”
The desire to shoot out of the gate quickly comes from having the advantage of hosting nine of the opening 14 games at home on the Gooding Arena court. The need to get off to a good start stems from having, for the first time, five conference games before the holiday break in December. A Centennial team that falls behind during this early stretch will be looking up from a deep hole.
If Mucci’s Fords can get on the positive side of the ledger early, the road games near the end of the schedule become less of a make-or-break proposition and the team can focus on the head-to-head battles with opponents they can look in the eye without league standings playing in the back of their minds.
For the first time in a long time the schedule will not kick off with an Equinox Classic game. Main Line rival Cabrini College awaits in the home opener November 16 with non-conference Equinox games at Haverford (Friday) and Swarthmore (Saturday) following. The Fords also have the top three teams in the Centennial preseason poll — in order, Franklin & Marshall, Gettysburg and Ursinus — within the fall portion of the schedule.
Picked sixth in the coaches’ voting with 77 points, the Fords sit behind Washington College who garnered 83 points in the polling. Muhlenberg at No. 4 is the other squad in the top-six.